Four US Chipmakers to Testify at Senate Hearing on Russia’s Export Control Evasion
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who chairs the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, announced Sept. 5 that officials from four large U.S. computing chip manufacturers will testify at a hearing next week on Russia’s efforts to evade U.S. export controls.
Blumenthal’s panel will hear from Tiffany Scurry, corporate vice president and chief compliance officer at Advanced Micro Devices; Michelle Stout, vice president for global trade compliance and government affairs at Analog Devices; Jeff Rittener, chief trade officer and vice president of the international trade group at Intel Corp.; and Shannon Thompson, vice president and assistant general counsel for commercial operations at Texas Instruments.
Blumenthal said he wants to find out at the Sept. 10 hearing what the companies are doing to prevent their products from ending up in Russian weapons used against Ukraine. “We must cut off Russia’s supply of these components, and that starts with answering the question of whether U.S. semiconductor manufacturers are doing enough to comply with critical export controls,” the senator said.
At a February hearing, Blumenthal said that chips and other high-tech equipment made by American companies were flowing to Russia’s war machine despite U.S. efforts to stop them with export controls and sanctions (see 2402270065). He said that Russia was using third-party intermediaries and bordering countries to evade U.S. restrictions. The four companies scheduled to testify this month were all mentioned during the February hearing, but were not participants, and after it they all issued statements saying they were taking steps to ensure their products didn't end up in Russian weapons.
In May, a Bureau of Industry and Security official said his agency and industry both need to do more to stop Russia from acquiring export-controlled semiconductors (see 2405080045).